Eric Cantona for president?

It's unlikely that he'll manage to get the support of the 500 mayors necessary to stand in the French presidential elections, but former international footballer Eric Cantona is apparently seriously thinking about it.

Image (screenshot from BFM TV report)

According to the national daily Libération, the 45-year-old has sent out a letter to all of the country's nearly 37,000 mayors seeking their backing and outlining how much of an "engaged citizen" he is.

In the letter he wrote that he wants to collect at least 500 signatures to "send out a clear and powerful message; a message of of truth and respect at a time when the country faces difficult choices which will be decisive about its future."

Image (screenshot from BFM TV report)

Cantona is already a sponsor of one of the country's most well-known charities helping the homeless, Fondation Abbé Pierre.

And he has the full backing off the Fondation which launched a petition in September 2011 to make homelessness and the lack of affordable housing a major issue in the presidential campaigns.

"We need a stimulus such as Cantona to restore (the issue of) housing to the place it deserves in the campaign," the Fondation's managing director Patrick Doutreligne told Agence France Presse.

So Cantona for president?

Well it'll be an uphill struggle. Even if he manages to collect those 500 signatures needed to stand, there's the additional problem of financing a credible campaign.

And few will forget his last foray into the political arena in December 2010 when he called for a run on the country's banks by encouraging savers to withdraw all their money in protest at the role of the banks in the global financial crisis.

That day of protest came and went with few heeding the call.

Do the French really need a 96-hour antiperspirant? Does anyone?

Apparently 96hour antiperspirant is better than soap and water - or at least a damn good alternative.

Invincible (screenshot from French commercial)

The weather has been unseasonably warm and worryingly dry throughout many parts of Europe over the past couple of months.

Already in France, 26 of the country's 95 mainland départements have water restrictions in place and the prognostication - what a lovely word - by weather forecasters is that the situation is unlikely to improve any time soon.

All of which is perhaps an explanation, albeit admittedly somewhat tenuous, for the decision by one the world's largest cosmetics and beauty companies to hit television screens with commercials for a product that promises 96 hour protection!

Yes unbelievably L'Oréal would appear to think that it's perfectly acceptable not to wash for four whole days and instead to rely on the wonders of its "Invincible" deodorant from the MenExpert range.

Indeed so proud does the Paris-based giant seem to be that it has not only lined up a couple of hunks to promote the product's properties, it has also released a video showing the "making of" the commercial.

Eric Cantona (screenshot from French commercial for Invincible)

In France former French international footballer Eric Cantona adds his virility to Invincible's obvious appeal for those whose jobs might require them to avoid soap and water for the best part of a week.

And elsewhere it's US actor and heartthrob Patrick Dempsey who's charged with extolling the virtues of 96-hour protection.





Clearly both men were paid enough to try to convince others that personal hygiene for men comes in the shape of a roll-on or spray deodorant effective under the most extreme conditions and for what just has to be an entirely inappropriate length of time.

What would their better halves (Rachida Brakni and Jillian Fink respectively) say of the two men if they regularly chose not to wash?

And how would partners of men being encouraged to use Invincible really react if they discovered they were sharing their lives with someone who preferred a quick underarm roll-on or spray to the more traditional cleansing properties of water?



Once again the question surely has to be asked - just as it was here a couple of weeks ago when looking at the pleasures offered by 72-hour protection - "What in heaven's name is going through the minds of manufacturers when they come up with the idea that anybody requires such a product in everyday life?"

Surely we're worth all worth better than that L'Oréal.

Coming soon - 120-hour protection?

Beurk - as the French might say.

Rachida Brakni's banking dilemma

Do you think the French actress Rachida Brakni had any problems with the recent remarks made by her husband Eric Cantona?

Rachida Brakni (screenshot from LCL commercial)

You remember surely.

Cantona is the former French international footballer who called on people to withdraw all their money from their bank accounts.

The suggestion from the newly-discovered "political philosopher" (as one BBC report dubbed him) came during an informal interview with journalists in October.

His idea was that rather than taking to the streets to demonstrate, people could go to the local branch of their bank and withdraw all their money, "Causing the banking system to crumble".

A peaceful protest of sorts to send a message to the whole banking system and financial services which, as far as Cantona was concerned, were at the root of much of the current misery in the world; homelessness, poverty, injustice.



It was a message that quickly found its way on to the Net with a campaign beginning, a date fixed for the "revolution" and financial experts and politicians wading in to urge caution.

The day of protest (December 7) came and went.

The world survived.

But wait.

What about that initial question as to whether Brakni had a problem with her husband's remarks.

After all she must know the guy pretty well. They've been married for the past three years and the couple have a one-year-old son, Emir.

The question has to be asked though because...well what was that commercial the 33-year-old actress appeared in for a couple of weeks back in April this year?

Oh yes. That's right.

It was for one of France's biggest banks LCL (Le Crédit Lyonnais) encouraging people to apply for mortgages - of all things.

Rachida Brakni dazns une publicité LCL Vidéo jeanmarcmorandini sélectionnée dans Pub

Ho hum.

Dinner time in the Cantona-Brakni household must have made for interesting conversation.